The following is from 7:51PM on 8 September:
More often than not, I find myself disparaging the West’s recent obsession with material science (I say recent because not so long ago, when the Chinese and Indians were studying the stars, inventing gunpowder, and perfecting meditation, Europeans were still rolling around in the mud and killing each other with sharpened wooden sticks). Not only is this ironic, it is a bit pigheaded on my part. Though I don’t always like to admit it, material progress and the advancement of scientific knowledge isn’t a bad thing. Indeed it has alleviated a great deal of human suffering and allowed for countless more beings to appreciate this precious human life. After all, I’m here halfway around the world because two brothers from Ohio figured out how to make objects that are heavier than air pretend, so long as they have adequate power, to be less heavy than air. I have clean water to drink because someone figured out how to kill viruses, bacteria, and protozoa with ultraviolet light and carbon filters. Why the sudden change of heart? Because the battery, the microprocessor, the LCD screen, and the 8,000 other patents that make up my laptop, allow me to write this blog post despite the fact that the power is out right now because of load-shedding. We can all thank the Second World War for the computer, I’m still not necessarily sold as to whether 55 million human lives are a fair trade. I guess the jury’s still out.
More often than not, I find myself disparaging the West’s recent obsession with material science (I say recent because not so long ago, when the Chinese and Indians were studying the stars, inventing gunpowder, and perfecting meditation, Europeans were still rolling around in the mud and killing each other with sharpened wooden sticks). Not only is this ironic, it is a bit pigheaded on my part. Though I don’t always like to admit it, material progress and the advancement of scientific knowledge isn’t a bad thing. Indeed it has alleviated a great deal of human suffering and allowed for countless more beings to appreciate this precious human life. After all, I’m here halfway around the world because two brothers from Ohio figured out how to make objects that are heavier than air pretend, so long as they have adequate power, to be less heavy than air. I have clean water to drink because someone figured out how to kill viruses, bacteria, and protozoa with ultraviolet light and carbon filters. Why the sudden change of heart? Because the battery, the microprocessor, the LCD screen, and the 8,000 other patents that make up my laptop, allow me to write this blog post despite the fact that the power is out right now because of load-shedding. We can all thank the Second World War for the computer, I’m still not necessarily sold as to whether 55 million human lives are a fair trade. I guess the jury’s still out.
Do you know what the man who invented the AK-47 said (the AK-47 is the most mass-produced gun in history and a greater weapon of mass destruction than any hypothetical Iranian nuclear bomb ever could be)? He said ‘I wish I invented the lawnmower.’ The iPad, despite being hugely entertaining, is pure evil. No good can or ever will come from an iPad, save for it maybe deflecting a bullet or stopping a knife. I feel equally strongly about twitter. Tweeting is for the birds. Reason #1 to love Nepal: no Apple stores. Thank the Buddha. Reason #2: No McDonalds; there is however, a Kentucky Fried Chicken, or as my cousin Kate once said, a ‘Kenfucky Fried Chicken.’ Power’s back on! There is a gecko on the ceiling, making gravity look like a punk. Good for it, gravity is a punk, weighing our souls down on this rock while it hurdles around our Sun, while our Sun hurdles around the Milky-way galaxy, while the Milky-way Galaxy hurdles around the local group of galaxies, while the local group of galaxies hurdles around the Virgo supercluster of galaxies (one of millions of galaxy superclusters in the observable universe), while the Virgo supercluster hurdles around the cosmos. Don’t be fooled. The planet Earth is a speck, on a speck, on a speck, on a speck, on a speck, on a speck. There’s a hell of a lot more out there, living and with various levels of intelligence. I’m not saying little green men with a penchant for anal-probing are abducting us and studying our physiology to eventually invade this planet. I’m saying the universe is way to freaking big for the Earth to be the only rock where some carbon got together with some oxygen and other stuff, and then started farting around forming cells, and nervous systems, and organs. Life is a diaspora, and there’s a lesson in that somewhere. Maybe, it’s because we are all born into this life as exiles from our own true nature, the Tathāgatagarbha or Buddha nature. Unlike most exiles though, all of us can go home, we just have to start walking the path. Peace.
The Frequency is Courage,
-Doug B.
P.S. Time to get used to squat toilets again.
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